


Locked Down

by ShayLynnD



Category: Lancer (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-20
Updated: 2020-06-20
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:27:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24821569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShayLynnD/pseuds/ShayLynnD
Summary: Johnny and Scott are quarantined during an epidemic.
Relationships: Brother/brother - Relationship





	Locked Down

Locked Down  
by Sherry F. Dancy

Being boxed in like this, it stirred up a restlessness he couldn't tamp down. Caught off guard and locked up, it left Johnny Madrid Lancer unsettled. Sure, there had been nights spent in jail. He'd even pulled a hard stretch in a Mexican prison, but this mess had snuck up on him as slick as any back-shooting enemy ever had. 

Johnny paced the small space and rubbed shaky fingers through his dark hair. If only he could sort a way out, maybe pull something out of his brain, a safe way out for the town, his brother, Doc Sam, and himself. 

"Johnny. That you?" Scott rolled off the other cot in the small room. "What time is it?"

"Didn't mean to wake you, Brother. Couldn't sleep." Johnny pulled a timepiece from his pocket and sidled over to the lantern to see better. "It's only 4:20. Sun ain't even up yet. Go on back to sleep."

"No, I wasn't asleep either. I've been lying here thinking." Scott sat with elbows on his thighs, looking at the floor. "Sam up?"

"Don't think so. It was pretty late when Doc went to bed." Johnny proceeded to the washstand and poured water from a blue porcelain pitcher into a matching basin. He leaned on the stand and shook his head. "He was real upset about losing that family. Figured it's cholera, and knowing what it could do, well, it's got him tore up."

The Lancers had been hearing news about the disease for a while now. "It is scary. Heard it started up North, Dakota Territory." Scott pumped fresh water into the pitcher and grabbed a clean towel.

"Yeah? Well, Sam says it's easy to catch and hard to treat. No way we can leave here 'til we're sure we aren't carrying it. I'm sorry I got you into this mess." Johnny stared at the rose-patterned rug between the two small beds.

Scott made a quick step toward him and placed a hand on Johnny's shoulder. "Nothing to be sorry for, Brother. You were helping folks out. I was helping you. It's what we do."

"Guess we were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Still, I don't see how Sam coulda managed without us. He couldn't have tended them and burned their belongings by himself." Johnny looked toward the window. Staring through the darkness, he could still see the nightmare from the night before. 

His brother's voice broke into his dark thoughts. "Someone had to help, might as well be us." Scott pulled on his boots and tucked a new tan shirt into jeans Sam had sent over from Green River General Store. "We need to get word to Murdoch. He'll be worried when we don't show up."

"Sam can send someone to the ranch." Johnny opened the outside door and stared longingly at the small yard behind Sam's house. "Think it's safe to sit out here?" 

"I don't see why not. As long as we keep away from others, we shouldn't spread the disease." The mere thought that either of them might have cholera silenced both men.

"Scott, you think we might come down with this thing?" Johnny's eyes glistened in the dawn light as he looked back toward Scott. "That family didn't go easy."

"Sam did all he could to make sure we sterilized everything. He said cleaning and quarantine; they're the best prevention. Let's pray it'll be enough." Scott shuddered. "I remember when typhoid hit during the war. We couldn't quarantine; getting clean was just a dream." He leaned against the door jam as if to find physical support.

"You get typhoid during the war?" Johnny asked, concern written all over his face. 

"I did. I don't remember a lot about it. I do know I thought I was dying. At one point, I prayed to die." Scott's fingers tightened on the door jam. He was quiet for more than a few minutes before he cleared his throat and continued. "Brother, that's not happening here. We are well and safe here together. Let's make the best of it."

Johnny grinned and tapped Scott's chest as he made his way back inside. "What do you say we raid Sam's kitchen? I need coffee and something to eat." 

Three days into Lockdown

"I'm tired of playing poker!" Johnny threw his cards down and scattered match sticks across the small table. Doc had insisted they remain inside their small room other than privy breaks and time spent in the backyard for fresh air. They had been run out of the kitchen that first morning. Sam said he didn't have time to sterilize every pot and pan, cup and saucer, plate and utensil in the place. That was when he had added the table and two chairs to their already crowded room. 

Now their food was delivered three times a day to the back porch. When the provider left, Scott and Johnny would step out and pick up whatever they were fortunate enough to get. It was mostly bread and canned food, so dishes didn't have to be sterilized. They both missed the excellent home-cooked meals from the ranch. And, it was only three days into the two-week quarantine. 

"Scott, I swear, I'll soon be dead from lack of food; never mind getting a disease!" Johnny looked up from a can of peaches and two slices of bread that one of the church ladies left for their lunch. "Surely, the ladies know we need more than this to eat." He banged the can down on the table, splashing juice out.

"You can have my bread." Scott pushed it toward him. 

"No!" Johnny was appalled that his brother would give up part of his meager meal for him. "I shouldn't complain. I remember a time when this would have been a feast."

"Me too. At least we're still well. Symptoms usually appear three to five days after exposure. Most likely, we will know if we are in the clear in a couple of days." Scott started picking up match sticks. 

Johnny grinned. "Sorry 'bout that." He stooped to help gather the cards and match sticks. "Scott, being locked down is tough, but you know, there's some good parts too."

"Good parts," Scott repeated while he shuffled the gathered cards. "I suppose you are about to enlighten me?"

"Well yeah," Johnny sat back down across from Scott. "It's good to slow down a bit." Johnny looked at his brother to make sure he understood his meaning. "My life's been like riding a fast horse since Mama died. I've been running from one fight to another, gunfights and range-wars. Then finding you and Murdoch, I had to fight a battle of my own between Johnny Madrid and Johnny Lancer." Johnny ran his hands through his hair. "You know, it wasn't easy to change lifestyles; settle down as a rancher. Still isn't sometimes. Anyway, this slowdown, it's the first time I've been able to take a breath. It's a chance to breathe different air and think on things. That's not so bad."

"No, breathing different air as you put it isn't a bad thing at all. Sometimes, difficult situations happen that force us to look at life differently." Scott's eyes stayed on his brother's bowed head for a minute before he continued. "I've heard it said that dark clouds have silver linings. I think, Brother, you may have found one."

Johnny laughed, "We'll know for sure if the silver strike is good when we come out of this disease-free." He pulled the stopper out of a pint of tequila Val had left on the back step last evening. "You up for a drink?" 

"Celebrating early?" 

"Why not, Boston? I think we may have this lockdown thing licked."

Six days into lockdown

"Johnny?" Scott saw that his brother's cot was empty. He looked around the room but saw no sign of His brother. Pulling the cover back, he slipped off the bed and headed out the door. "What are you doing out here? The sun's not even up."

"I know, but you know what day it is?"

"What day is it?" Scott suppressed a knowing smile. 

Johnny shoved his brother. "You know exactly what day this is. It's day six. Sam said most folks got cholera three to five days after being around someone else that had it. Sooooo..."

"So, you're what? Breathing a sigh of relief?"

"Maybe. Maybe I'm breathing some of that different air we talked about." Johnny looked out at some of the stars still visible in the early morning sky. 

"Breathing that new air, huh?" Scott took a deep breath and 'breathed' a prayer of thanks that so far he and his brother were safe. 

Fourteen days into lockdown

"Scott, Johnny, where are you?" Sam knew they would be anxious to get out of their quarantine. He opened the door when his knock went unanswered. 

The back door was standing open, and he could hear the boys talking. Johnny and Scott thought they had found a silver mine. And what was that? Johnny wanted new air to breathe. Scott was saying he was glad Johnny got off a fast horse. 

Oh my! They must be delirious! Could they somehow have acquired the disease on their last day of quarantine? 

Locked Down was written in May 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic.

From True West Magazine:

August 1873, Dr. J.B. Van Velson, city physician for Yankton, capital of Dakota Territory, reported upon the arrival of some Russian emigrants who came directly from their port of entrance in New York City to settle temporarily in unoccupied buildings throughout the town.

These Russians were to be located "upon the farms in the territory that had been selected for them," he wrote. The large majority of these emigrants "were of the lower classes, filthy in persons and habits" and "in the majority of instances, it was impossible to compel them to adopt any sanitary precautions in their lives; the utmost repugnance was shown to the use of privies, both sexes preferring to urinate and defecate immediately around the building in which they were located."

Dr. Van Velson then described the multiple deaths from cholera among these people and others in Yankton, sometimes occurring after only a few hours illness. His theory, widely held by other physicians at the time, was that cholera was brought by immigrants in this country from endemic areas overseas.

The 1873 cholera epidemic in Yankton was only a small part of a greater epidemic that affected at least 18 states and territories, including the state of Texas and the Territory of Utah. The epidemic was so severe that it led to a joint resolution of Congress on March 25, 1874, authorizing an "inquiry into and report upon the causes" of this disaster. President Ulysses S. Grant submitted the 1,144-page report, authored by Dr. John M. Woodworth (supervising surgeon, U.S. Merchant Marine Hospital Service), to Congress on January 12, 1875. The more than 7,000 cases and hundreds of deaths described in this report were probably only a small fraction of the actual morbidity and mortality of this epidemic.

The association between unsanitary conditions—especially drinking water contaminated with infected human feces—and the development of cholera was basically understood in 1873 America. Physicians also realized that contact with the "cholera poison" coming from an infected patient's vomit or diarrhea could lead to the spread of the disease. The importance of hygiene was underscored by Dr. Woodworth's conclusion: "What vaccination is to small-pox, disinfection is to cholera."

We know today that cholera is caused by an enteric (fecal) bacterial organism called the Vibrio cholerae. In its severe form, the disease is characterized by the sudden onset of painless, profuse, explosive, "rice water" diarrhea with nausea and vomiting. Untreated cases lead to rapid dehydration, electrolyte imbalances, kidney failure and shock (circulatory collapse) culminating in death, sometimes within a few hours. The descriptions of untreated cholera patients are among the most disturbing in the medical literature. While losing fluids from both ends of the digestive tract, the patient is afflicted with an insane thirst; in a matter of hours, his skin shrivels and ages from dehydration.

Very often, on the frontier, cholera patients suffered and died quickly without any medical attention. A cholera epidemic could wipe out 50 to 60 percent of the population of a wagon train or small settlement. Consequently, quarantine was one method widely used on the frontier to limit the spread of the disease.

The modern treatment for cholera is centered upon the immediate replenishment of fluids and electrolytes either orally, intravenously or both. Often antibiotics are administered in conjunction with rehydration therapy. Early medical treatments varied widely. Some included the administration of laudanum (opium), sulphur, sulphuric acid, spirits of camphor, turpentine, acetate of lead and even mustard plasters placed over the stomach and bowels. Some early remedies correctly included the replenishment of fluids by the ingestion of salt and sugar or even lemonade.

Compared with many other diseases, the treatment for cholera is fairly simple and effective. In this column, I usually write from the comfort of the 21st century about often obsolete and misunderstood medical problems that afflicted our predecessors in the Old West. How is it, then, that, as I write this article, the number of cholera cases in the current outbreak in Zimbabwe Africa is greater than 12,700 and the death toll stands at more than 1,100? Dr. Woodworth, where art thou?


End file.
